1. Field of Art
The present invention generally relates to delivering audio content and, more specifically, to generating audio content having similar audio and musicological features to other audio content delivered to a user.
2. Background of the Invention
A content server may earn revenue by including sponsored audio among user-desired content and receiving payment from sponsors in return. For example, a content server may insert sponsored audio between songs in an audio content stream provided to a user. However, inserting sponsored audio into content may disrupt the user experience, causing some users to pay less attention to the provided content or to terminate the application delivering the content. When users terminate an application delivering content from the content server, the content server cannot serve sponsored audio and loses revenue. Accordingly, disruptions to the user experience reduce content server revenue.
The disruption to the user experience from sponsored content is exacerbated when the sponsored audio is dissimilar from other content provided to a user. In traditional media, producers may manually select and sequence sponsored audio to improve coherency (e.g., during commercial breaks). However, in a personalized media distribution environment, manually sequencing sponsored audio may be infeasible because of the sheer number of personalized media channels. As a result, content servers providing a variety of content may present sponsored audio that is mismatched with surrounding content, which disrupts the user experience and consequently reduces content server revenue.